A Genre of Animal Hanky Panky?
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Kelly Hübben ©Kelly Hübben, Stockholm University 2017 ISBN print 978-91-7649-962-7 ISBN PDF 978-91-7649-963-4 Printed in Sweden by Universitetsservice US-AB, Stockholm 2017 Distributor: Department of Culture and Aesthetics, Stockholm University To Viktor and Evelyn Fandango and Carlitos Contents Table of Contents Acknowledgements ....................................................................... 3 Introduction ................................................................................... 5 The Little Golden Books .................................................................... 11 Problems with anthropomorphism .................................................... 15 Issues of species and identity ............................................................ 24 The ethical dimension of reading popular picture books .................... 27 Disposition ....................................................................................... 30 Chapter 1: Pethood and childhood in the context of middle class America ....................................................................................... 32 Koko and The Three Little Kittens ...................................................... 33 The Little Golden Books: A Genre of Animal Hanky-Panky? ................ 41 The importance of education, animals and anthropomorphism within a middle class context .......................................................................... 52 Anthropomorphism .......................................................................... 59 Case study 1: Pethood and childhood: canine characters .................... 66 Caring, responsibility and ownership .................................................... 70 The domestic ethic of kindness and My Puppy .................................... 71 Family life from a dog’s point of view: Our Puppy (1948) .................... 73 The animal (m)other ............................................................................. 75 Teaching speciesism in picture books ................................................... 79 The Ugly Dachshund: the importance of breed and performance ....... 80 Friendship across species boundaries: the story of Mister Dog ........... 85 Case study 2: Feline characters, pethood and teaching empathy ........ 90 How to care for cats: My Little Golden Book About Cats ..................... 95 Finding one’s ‘right’ place in society: The Kitten Who Thought He Was a Mouse .............................................................................................. 100 My Kitten ............................................................................................. 105 Celebration of difference in The Shy Little Kitten ............................... 111 Chapter 2: Discourses of domestication, taming and wildness .... 114 Discourses of domestication ............................................................ 116 Representations of domestication in children’s culture ..................... 121 Case study 3: Little centaurs: child riders and their horses. ............... 127 1 A history of horsemanship .................................................................. 129 ‘Putting the horse in history’ or domesticated dreams? The Little Golden Book adaptation of National Velvet ....................................... 137 Fury: orphaned boys and wild horses ................................................. 146 Case study 4: Circus animals; animals in the entertainment industry; animals as propaganda ................................................................... 152 J. Fred Muggs ...................................................................................... 153 The uprising of animal entertainers in Topsy Turvy Circus ................. 157 “Only you can prevent wildfires”: Smokey the Bear (1955) and Smokey Bear and the Campers (1961) ............................................................. 160 Chapter 3: Killing, hunting and eating anthropomorphized animals .................................................................................................. 172 The problems of hunting, killing and meat eating in children’s literature ....................................................................................................... 173 Case study 5: Anthropomorphism’s function in the representation of predation ........................................................................................ 180 Hunting, killing and meat consumption in Pierre Bear ....................... 180 Giving up hunting as a sign of civilization: The Tawny Scrawny Lion . 191 Conflicting starting points for moral consideration in The Goose That Stuffed Herself .................................................................................... 194 How to survive as anthropomorphic pigs in a human world: Gaston and Josephine ............................................................................................ 196 Case study 6: postcolonial readings of human and animal characters 202 A canine Robinsonade: The Sailor Dog ............................................... 204 Encountering human and nonhuman others in The Little Trapper .... 207 Rewriting colonialism: The Boy and the Tigers. .................................. 213 An exploration of diversity through animal stories? Tales from around the world. ............................................................................................ 214 Conclusions ................................................................................ 217 Pets and domestic spaces ................................................................ 219 Wild and domesticated spaces and species ...................................... 221 Anthropomorphism and ethics ........................................................ 223 Open questions ............................................................................... 224 Sammanfattning ........................................................................ 225 Illustrations ............................................................................... 227 Bibliography .............................................................................. 229 Bibliography Little Golden Books ................................................ 237 2 Acknowledgements Thanks are in order. Thanks go to my supervisors, for their invaluable advice, their knowledge, their faith in my work, their patience and their encouragement. Thanks to my colleagues, who were there to listen, to motivate, to challenge, to cheer me up, to console, to share frustrations and successes. Thanks to my friends, human and nonhuman, who took me to new places. Thanks to my family. To those who were there from the beginning. To those who entered the world while I worked on this project and those who left before it was completed. To all of you who walked this path with me. You know who you are. To my muse. For everything. 3 4 2010). Curiously, Schmidt also changed the gender of the cat: Dutch Pinkie is a little tomcat. From an intercultural perspective, this is very interesting, but I will not dwell on it here. What is important to realize is that the images do not favor one gender; there is nothing about the kitten that makes her con- clusively male or female. This is an aspects of fictional animals that has been highlighted by numerous scholars who study the function of animal charac- ters. One of the arguments that are often used is that these animals eliminate the need to specify categories that are significant and hard to disguise when dealing with human characters, such as gender, class or ethnicity. The charisma of the kitten also demonstrates what the Little Golden Books are famous for: no matter how charming the story, the images are what ultimately establishes their lasting impression. The playful qualities that are so characteristic of the illustrations captivate young imaginations and never let go. The same can be said about the Little Golden Books as ma- terial objects: the cardboard covers, the golden spines through which you could feel the staples, the structure and smell of the paper all contributed to the unique Golden Book experience. It is perhaps a truism that animals are ubiquitous in children’s books. Throughout the